Journal of Organics (JO), Volume 1 Number 1, 2014
Ernesto Genoni: Australia’s
pioneer of biodynamic agriculture
John Paull
School of Land & Food, University of Tasmania, Australia
[email protected]
He was dark, with flashing eyes, hair swept back off his forehead and an erect exotic
look. If his brothers were jovial, easy going and inclined to be portly, Ernesto was
slender, serious, aesthetic and elegant. His voice was clipped, his sentences crisp
and his manner refined. They called him ‘il filosofo’ the philosopher, but he was
really an artist ... ‘Chemicals will kill the world,’ Ernesto would say, little realising
that in sixty years his would no longer be a voice crying in the wilderness (Maria
Triaca, 1985, p.116).
Archived at http://orgprints.org/27514
Abstract
Ernesto Genoni (1885-1975) pioneered biodynamic agriculture in Australia. In 1928 he
was the first of (ultimately) twelve Australians to join Rudolf Steiner’s Experimental Circle
of Anthroposophical Farmers and Gardeners (ECAFG) which was based at the
Goetheanum, Dornach, Switzerland. Ernesto trained as an artist for five years at Milan’s
prestigious Brera Academy. He visited his brothers in Australia, broad-acre immigrant
farmers in Western Australia, in 1912 and 1914 and during these visits he worked on
their, and other’s, farms. In 1916 he enlisted in the Australian Imperial Force (AIF) and
served as a stretcher bearer on the battlefields of the Somme, France, before being
conscripted into the Italian Army and serving jail-time in Italy as a draft resister and
conscientious objector. Ernesto joined the Anthroposophical Society in Milan in 1919. He
first met Rudolf Steiner in 1920 at the Goetheanum, the Anthroposophy headquarters in
Switzerland. Ernesto left the Goetheanum in 1924 when Steiner retired from public life.
He migrated to Australia in 1926 with aspirations for establishing a career as an artist in
Australia. Instead, having arrived in Australia, he was again drawn into farm management
and agricultural work. Ernesto was a champion for biodynamic agriculture,
Anthroposophy, and the Austrian New Age philosopher, Rudolf Steiner - causes to which
he devoted the rest of his life. In 1928 he initiated the first Anthroposophy meetings in
Melbourne. In 1930 Ernesto made a grand tour of biodynamic enterprises in Europe and
met the leading biodynamics advocates and practitioners of the day in Germany,
Switzerland and England, including Ehrenfried Pfeiffer, Erika Riese, Ernst Stegemann,
and Carl Mirbt. In 1935 Ernesto and his partner, Ileen Macpherson, who was also an
anthroposophist and a member of the ECAFG, began their biodynamic farm called
Demeter Biological Farm in Dandenong, Victoria. Ernesto was a founder of the
Anthroposophical Society Victoria Michael Group in 1932, and he became its leader in
1962.
Keywords: Biodynamics, biodynamic farming, organic agriculture, organic farming,
Anthroposophy, Milan, WWI, Somme, Pozières, Dornach, Goetheanum, Broomehill,
Broome Hill, Western Australia, Demeter, Rudolf Steiner, Ehrenfried Pfeiffer, Ernst
Stegemann, Ruby Macpherson.
ISSN 2204-1060
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Journal of Organics (JO), Volume 1 Number 1, 2014
1 Introduction
Ernesto Genoni (1885-1975) was a man torn
between two worlds. In Italy he was an artist
(Fig.1), in Australia he was a farmer. In
Europe he was a married man, in Australia he
was a de facto partner. In Italy there was his
sister Rosa, old enough to be his mother and
for whom he was the “favourite”, in Australia
there were “the brothers” who had preceded
him and created their own Little Italy in the
wheat belt of Western Australia with their
homesteads, including “Etna” and “Sorrento”,
and their successful broad-acre farms
(Genoni, c.1955). In Australia, Ernesto
volunteered in the Australian Imperial Force
(AIF) in World War I (WWI) “to serve in the
medical corps”, but, as an Australian
stretcher-bearer on the killing fields of the
Somme he was conscripted into the Italian
Army, quite possibly saving his life but leading
to multiple prison terms in Italian jails as a
draft resister and a conscientious objector.
Figure 1. Ernesto Genoni, self portrait, circa
Ernesto brought biodynamic agriculture and 1920-1926.
Anthroposophy to Australia in the 1920s. He
was the first Australian member of Rudolf Steiner’s Experimental Circle of Anthroposophical Farmers and Gardeners (ECAFG) whose raison d'être was to put to the test
the “hints” given in 1924 by Rudolf Steiner at his Agriculture Course presented at
Koberwitz (now Kobierzyce). Ernesto met Rudolf Steiner, and leading anthroposophists
Elizabeth Vreede (mathematician), and Edith Maryon (sculptor) at the Goetheanum at
Dornach, Switzerland in 1920. He spent much of 1924 at the Goetheanum, painting and
studying, until September 1924 when Steiner withdrew from public life due to ill health.
Ernesto migrated to Australia in 1926 announcing plans for exhibiting his art. He left
Australia in 1930 for a six-month grand tour of biodynamic endeavours in Europe, visiting
the leading advocates and practitioners of biodynamics of the day, including Dr
Ehrenfried Pfeiffer and Ernst Stegemann. It was the last time he would depart Australia
as an “Italian”. In 1932 he applied to be a naturalized Australian and thereby cemented
his commitment to the New World while maintaining his links to the Old.
Ernesto’s commitment to biodynamics and Anthroposophy were lifelong. He practiced
biodynamics in Western Australia and in Victoria. With his partner, Ileen Macpherson
(1899-1984), he established the first “Demeter” farm in Australia. He was a founder of the
Anthroposophical Society Victoria, aka the Michael Group, and in his twilight years he
was its leader. This is his story.
2 Methods
The present account draws on primary sources including archival material (held in
Switzerland and Australia) and a handwritten autobiographical manuscript memoir by the
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subject, supplemented by published material. Sources drawn on for the present account
include the Secretariat of the Goetheanum, Dornach, Switzerland, the Archives of the
Goetheanum (Dokumentation am Goetheanum Bibliothek Kunstsammlung Archiv), the
Australian National Archives, Canberra, the Italian Historical Society (CO.AS.IT), Carlton,
Victoria, Australian newspapers, a published account of the extended family, and the
Library, Archives and members of the Anthroposophical Society in Australia Victorian
Branch, the Michael Group.
3 Results
3.1 Italy
Our situation was destitute ... the money lender, after some time, refused to give us
bread, as did the owner of the delicatessen .... because our debt was too high
(Genoni, c.1955, p.3).
Ernesto Genoni was born at Tirano, 170 km north east of Milan, on 21 September 1885
(Italian Embassy, 1916). A timeline with some milestones of his life is presented in Table
1. Ernesto was reportedly one of 18 children, of whom eleven survived into adulthood
with Ernesto being the youngest of those (Triaca, 1985). WIth the exception of the eldest
sister, Rosa Genoni, all of the surviving Genoni siblings migrated to Australia, starting
with the departure of Emilio, at the age of 17, with Ernesto recording in his memoir: “The
departure of Emilio for Australia in the first year of school” (Genoni, c.1955, p.1). As we
shall see, Ernesto was a somewhat hesitant migrant and he was the final of the siblings
to migrate.
In a family memoir, Maria Triaca wrote that “a steady exodus of people from our region
began in the 1890s” (1985, p.5). The reasons appear to be at least twofold, privation and
conscription. As a unified country, Italy was then a relatively young country with the
Kingdom of Italy being proclaimed in 1861 (Nicolle, 2003). At the outbreak of World War 1
(WWI) “Italy remained an overwhelmingly agricultural country, and over three-quarters of
the rural population were landless peasants” (Nicolle, 2003, p.3). Nevertheless Italy
harboured imperial aspirations and at the end of the nineteenth century, and following the
lead of other European powers, embarked on a series of military misadventures of landgrabbing in Africa, collectively described as “The Scramble for Africa
1876-1912” (Pakenham, 1992). Italy supported its military adventurism by conscripting its
young men. This was the immediate cause of Emilio’s departure for Australia, alone and
at the age of 17 years (C. Negri, 1984).
Subsequently, each brother, migrated to Australia as they became of conscriptionable
age. According to a daughter, Emilio “made a promise to his father that he’d bring out all
his brothers and sisters, so therefore he promised he would send so much every three
months home, and that is what he did, and he brought them out one by one” (C. Negri,
1984, p.3). The youngest brother, Ernesto was the exception to this pattern. One of
Emilio’s daughters stated in an interview, many years after the events, that for her father
Emilio “military service was coming up ... He was reaching the age of eighteen and he
was anti-war, so he decided that he would ... leave Italy. And his father ... said to him ‘I
don’t know what you are going to do ... you have to have money’. So he borrowed and
the fare cost thirteen pounds and I think he borrowed about twenty pounds. He had to go
to England to pick up the boat” (E. Negri, 1984, p.1). According to her account “His father
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Journal of Organics (JO), Volume 1 Number 1, 2014
had a shop [in Milan], where they used to make shoes for the elite ... he used to employ
five to seven men” (E. Negri, 1984, p.2), however Ernesto’s account paints a far less rosy
picture.
Having arrived in Australia, the teenage Emilio initially worked for a German bootmaker in
Collins Street, Melbourne, before heading west where, after a short stint in Kalgoolie,
“Dad went down to Broomehill and he was able to get a job putting down the railway line,
the Great Southern Railway line from Perth” (E. Negri, 1984, p.4). “While he was there
going through Broomehill he happened to see some land and that’s when he bought his
first property which he called ‘Milan Place’” (E. Negri, 1984, p.5). This was the beginning
of a Little Italy in the south west corner of Western Australia in the wheat belt and to
where, over time, further Genoni brothers and sisters migrated and set up homesteads
and broadacre farms. These Australian developments occurred during the childhood of
Ernesto Genoni which was spent in Italy and which was, by his own account, one of
privation.
Ernesto’s memoir begins in “1889 or 1890” where he describes himself as “a sickly little
boy” and he recalls “the anxious search for the beret with the pom pom in the middle that
I had lost” (Genoni, c.1955, p.1). Of his time at the kindergarten in Tirano he writes of “the
painful chilblains on the hands” (p.1). He goes to stay with his grandmother in Grosio and
in the first grade he remembers “the piece of wood that we had to take to school each
morning to keep the fire going in the stove” (p.1). At kindergarten he recalls “the cherries
shared out among the children” (p.1), his “affectionate grandma”, and “the roasted
chestnuts that she would give to us in bed in the morning” (p.2).
“October 1892 we departed from Grosio with mum and [brother] Achille ... Grandma
accompanied us to the end of the road past the church. The affectionate goodbye ... we
were never again to see her in this life” (Genoni, c.1955, p.2). Ernesto writes of the
“intense morning coldness” and of Milan as “the beginning of my long period of sadness
and nostalgia” (p.3). At school there was “the young assistant who detested us”, he
remembers that “the Milanese youngsters detested us and mocked us” and that these
were “sad days for the two country children” (p.3).
Ernesto describes the financial position of the family as “destitute” and their dwelling as
“the tight hovel” (Genoni, c.1955, p.3). He mentions his ongoing anaemia during his
teenage years and his unrequited love: “the vision of the girl at the water pump. My
infatuation lasted several years without me ever having the courage to divulge my
feelings” (Genoni, c.1955, p.8).
Ernesto studied art at Milan’s Brera (Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera; Brera Academy of
Fine Art) for five years (1906-1910) (Genoni, c.1955). Ernesto says he was “always the
favourite brother of Rosa” (p.5). Rosa was the eldest of the siblings and the ‘matriarch’ of
the family, she forged a successful career and life in Italy as a fashion designer (R.
Genoni, 1924), as the wife of a leading Milan lawyer, and as a “socialist” (E. Negri, 1984,
p.6) and a peace activist (WILPF, 1921). Rosa supported the migration of the siblings,
and she kept in regular contact, however she herself never visited Australia. When
Ernesto first departed for Australia in 1911, Rosa was the final remaining of the Genoni
siblings in Italy.
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Table1: Timeline for Ernesto Genoni.
Date
Event
21 September 1885 Born at Tirano, Italy (Italian Embassy, 1916).
c.1890
Ernesto’s eldest brother, Emilio, leaves for Australia (Genoni, c.1955).
October 1902
German Section of the Theosophical Society founded, with Dr Rudolf Steiner
as General Secretary (Wachsmuth, 1989).
1906-1910
Studies art at Brera Academy, Milan, for 5 years (Genoni, c.1955).
1908
“I first became interested in spirituality” (Genoni, c.1955, p.10).
New Years Eve
1911/1912
Arrives at Fremantle, Western Australia (his first time in Australia); “I find life
glorious” (Genoni, c.1955, p.10).
January 1913
German Section is expelled from the Theosophical Society. The Anthroposophical Society is constituted in February 1913 with Rudolf Steiner as
Honorary President. Assets and most members of the German Section
transfer to the new society. (Easton, 1980, Lissau,2005).
1913
Returns to Italy; “the most awful time of my life” (Genoni, c.1955, p.11).
1914
Returns to Australia (Genoni, c.1955).
28 July 1914
Outbreak of World War I (WWI).
25 February 1916
Enlists as a volunteer in the Australian Imperial Force at Blackboy Hill, WA;
Religion: Theosophy; “I enlisted in order to serve in the medical corps” (AIF,
1916a; Genoni, c.1955, p.13).
17 April 1916
Embarked from Fremantle, WA, on the ‘Aeneas’ troop carrier (AIF, 1917).
7 June -14 June
1916
Embarked for Alexandria, Egypt, on the ‘Ionian’, to join the British
Expeditionary Force (BEF), disembarked Marseille, France (AIF, 1916b).
19 August 1916
Joined the 16th Battalion from the 17th Reinforcements, France (AIF, 1917).
26 August 1916
“Taken on strength of 16th Battalion A.I.F, France” (BEF, 1916).
29 August 1916
Italy declares war on Germany (Bean, 1929).
18 October 1916
Discharged from the AIF “In order to join the Italian Army” (He was
conscripted) (AIF, 1916f).
19 October 1916
Reported to the Italian Embassy, London (AIF, 1916h).
1916
“Refusal to repeat the giuramento formula. Sent to prison” near Verona and
then training in the medical corps (Genoni, c.1955, p.16).
11 November 1918 Armistice, end of WWI.
March 1919
Finally discharged from the Italian Army (Genoni, c.1955, p.18).
1919
Introduced to Anthroposophy by his sister Rosa Genoni in Milan (Genoni, c.
1955, p.18).
1920
First visit to the Goetheanum, Dornach, Switzerland (Genoni, c.1955, p.19).
c.1920 -1924
“The sad marriage” to Lydia Hillbrand (Genoni, 1932b; c.1955, p.19).
1924
At the Goetheanum, Dornach, from the beginning of the year until after
Steiner is taken ill in September (Genoni, c.1955, p.20)
31 May 1926
Arrived in Fremantle, WA, on the ‘Città di Genova’ from Genova, Italy
(Genoni, 1932b).
c.1926 -1928
2 years living at Hawthorn, Victoria (Genoni, 1932b).
1928
Started regular Anthroposophy meeting in Melbourne with Mrs Anne Macky
(Genoni, c.1955, p.21)
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Date
Event
1928
Joined the Experimental Circle of Anthroposophical Farmers and Gardeners
(ECAFG) nominating Dalmore Farm, Victoria as the experimental site; the
first Australian member of the ECAFG (Paull, 2013).
c.1929 -1933
At Etna, Emilio’s farm, WA, with many visits to Melbourne (Genoni, 1932b; c.
1955; Macpherson, c.1990).
19 May 1930 “Agricultural studies: Biodynamics trip to Europe; visited Switzerland,
19 November 1930 Germany & England (Genoni, 1932b).
2 March 1932
Application for Australian Naturalization. His occupation was farmer, he was
employed by Emilio Genoni at ‘Etna’, Certificate received 11 August (Genoni,
1932a; 1932b).
1932
Ernesto is a founding member of the Anthroposophical Society Victoria
Michael Group (Macpherson, c.1990).
c.1933
Melbourne, Victoria; “I first met Ileen [Macpherson] and Mrs [Ruby]
Macpherson” (Genoni, c.1955, p.23).
1935
‘Demeter Biological Farm’ a biodynamic farm in Dandenong of Ernesto
Genoni and Ileen Macpherson, the name “registered in 1935” (Macpherson,
c.1990, p.1).
14 March 1935
“Ileen comes to live at the farm”, Victoria (Genoni, c.1955, p.23).
1939
Final visit to Dornach (Genoni, c.1955).
1952
Ernesto & Ileen, “we decide to build a house in Namur St. [Noble Park,
Victoria]” (Genoni, c.1955, p.26).
1962
Ernesto becomes the leader of the Anthroposophical Society Victoria, the
Michael Group (Macpherson, c.1990).
11 February 1975
Dies, Melbourne, Australia; aged 89 years (Sekretariat, 1924-1975).
3.2 Little Italy in Western Australia
Australia!! ... I find life glorious! (Genoni, c.1955, p.10).
Ernesto arrived at Fremantle, Western Australia (WA) on New Year’s Eve 1911/12
(Genoni, c.1955). He had left a European winter and arrived in the middle of an Australian
summer. He writes: “Australia!! The great joy of having my name called from the crowd
while waiting to disembark from the ‘Austerlitz’. We talked all night with the brothers in
Rina’s house” (p.10). The brothers had broadacre farms at Broome Hill (it is now
Broomehill), 304 km from Perth (www.googlemaps.com) (Fig. 2).
Ernesto records: “Some painting but soon I am fully into farming at Etna”, Emilio’s farm
(Genoni, c.1955, p.10). He writes cryptically of “Spiritualism ... the idea of the colony
suggested by Rosa. Morris surprises me in seeing how seriously he takes up the ideas of
spiritualism” (pp.10-11).
Maria Triaca describes the Little Italy that the Genoni brothers had created in the wheat
belt of WA and that Ernesto was now stepping into:
“The Genoni brothers - Angelo, Maurice, Achille, Charlie, Jack and Emil - were an
extraordinary, if not eccentric bunch. They arrived in the West in dribs and drabs in the
1890s just as the gold rush was beginning. After a stint in the mines they turned to clearing
land in the south-west. They were pioneers who lived first in tents, then slab huts and
farmhouses on their own properties. Ernesto, the artist and youngest of the family, who had
a predilection for spiritualism and organic farming, had not yet arrived in Australia. The
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brothers’ farms were all within a
few miles of each other, roughly
in a straight line between the
towns of Flat Rocks and
Borderdale ... Italian names
prevailed when the brothers
selected their properties which
bore titles like Sorrento, Etna
and Belvedere” (Triaca, 1985, p.
89).
“Sorrento, Angelo’s property,
was the showplace of the
district. It was a sprawling brick
place with all the trappings of a
Figure 2. Broomehill, wheat belt of WA (photo: J.Paull, 2014).
Victorian townhouse - ceiling
roses, cornices, Persian rugs
and a cellar off the kitchen” (p.89)
“Angelo was famous for his wines from Broomehill to Tambellup. He spent hours in the
vineyard behind the house, pruning and spraying the grapes. The cellar was full of his
homemade wine, but he also made grappa - highly illegal - in a still ... Every agent or wool
buyer who visited Sorrento was offered a glass of the virulent clear spirit” (p.90).
“The garden at Sorrento was just as grand as the house. Standing in the centre was a
fountain ... this was Angelo’s way a creating a little bit of Italy in the middle of Australia ...
Out the back was the vineyard, rows and rows of grapevines, pear trees and apples, figs
and lemons. Nothing was left to chance. WIth the pigs, geese and ducks, we could have
been totally self-sufficient My new brother-in-law was a mixture of Australian outback
toughness and European civility and extravagance. WIth no farming background - he
worked in a wine shop before coming to Australia - he had developed a successful farm
running a thousand sheep. He mustered on horseback, cleared mallet thickets, classed
wool, was at home on a jinker and became an expert rifle shot ... My sister [from Italy]
walked into this environment and felt happier than ever before. She became the perfect
farmer’s wife” (pp.90-91).
“Part of her luggage included a collection of seeds, and within months of their arrival, the
vegetable garden at Sorrento was crammed with vegetables none of us had seen since
leaving home: zucchini, endive, chicory and flat-leaved parsley” (pp.98-99).
“Angelo was a voracious reader ... Although brought up a Catholic, conventional religion
held nothing for him and he had long discarded it, but he was very interested in philosophy
and later turned to spiritualism and anthroposophy as a follower of Rudolf Steiner” (p.91).
At this time of his life Ernesto was a dapper young Italian artist, a city boy with five years
of training at Milan’s Brera Academy. The opportunities in the bush were for farming, for
hard physical labour. If there were opportunities for plying his trade as an artist they might
have been found in the cities, in Perth or Melbourne for example, but Ernesto does not
appear to have seriously explored such options. The brothers had forged their new lives
in their adopted country; from teenage migrants they were now men of the land, who had
spent their whole adult life in the Australian ‘bush’ and under the Aussie sun. Ernesto
would certainly have been the odd man out, and he was restless. He writes: “About April
1913 I go with Angelo to Victoria. Angelo marries Matilde. Philip L’Hardy wants to settle
me on the land on the Kowerup [Koo Wee Rup, WA] farm. I refuse the offer and after a
few weeks ... I return to Italy by the English boat” (Genoni, c.1955, p.11).
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Journal of Organics (JO), Volume 1 Number 1, 2014
3.3 Return to Italy
Back in Italy. I am 28 and indeed I am going through the most awful time in my life
(Genoni, c.1955, p.11).
The decision to return to Italy in 1913 quickly turns sour for Ernesto. He writes that: “at
last I decide to return to Australia” (p.11).
Ernesto’s situation had been different from that of his siblings. The brothers had left Italy
to avoid Italy’s conscription, and both brothers and sisters alike had migrated to a new
land to forge a new life. They had done just that, and by all accounts remarkably
successfully. There was little or nothing for them in Italy, they had left as 17 year olds, or
thereabouts, and while they were creating their happy ‘Little Italy’, they were, by now,
more Australian than Italian, their business interests were in Australia, the skill sets
acquired were those of the Australian bush, their adult life was all Australian, their
children were Australian, and their futures were Australian. Ernesto and the brothers were
siblings but the passage of time and their divergent experiences meant that Ernesto was
an Italian while the brothers were now Australian, albeit of Italian heritage.
In contrast to his siblings, Ernesto seems to have visited Australia on a mission of
reconnaissance rather than as a decisive emigration. The skills he brought were Italian
skills, and the adult life experience that he brought was that of Italian big-city. There were
the New World opportunities of Australia, but in stark competition were the Old World
nostalgia and the familiarity of Italy. For Ernesto it was an unsettling dichotomy, which by
a combination of circumstances and luck, good and bad, took more than a decade to
resolve.
3.4 Return to Australia & enlistment
Every young man was then enlisting so I thought to enlist too (Genoni, c.1955, p.12).
Ernesto writes: “1914! After a month or two I am working at Etna the World War One
starts” (Genoni, c.1955, p.11). It is no easy life: “after clearing 5 acres at Punchimarup I
take up a contract to cut and burn down 50 acres by myself. The life in the bush camped
in a tent. The hard work of cutting the green plants at the level of the ground. Toward the
end Morris comes to help me” (p.11).
This was followed by more land clearing until “one morning the wind blew away the
tent” (Genoni, c.1955, p.12). Ernesto “left the brothers” and “at Brunswick. There I got
work at Mr Smith digging potatoes. At first I was lodging at the hotel but then I got a tent
and was camping in the bush” (p.12). Having finished the potatoes, Mr Smith “got me a
job at the local State farm as a driver with 2 horses and a lorry carting maize to make
insilage” (p.12). There was work but Ernesto remained restless. “Life was too easy and
without any interest. Xmas 1915! What a poor Xmas! Alone in the bush with a sore
finger” (p.12).
At this point Ernesto made a fateful decision that shaped his next decade - a decision
laced with some irony given that his brothers had migrated to Australia to avoid
conscription in Italy and that his sister Rosa was a leading peace activist in Italy. Ernesto
writes: “At new year day 1916 I went to Bunbury to enlist with the purpose of serving in
the medical corps. Fifteen days after I was at the Blackboy camp near Perth. It was not
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an easy life at first. Sleeping on a bare floor ... And all that swearing!” (Genoni, c.1955, p.
12).
On his enlistment papers, Ernesto had his age as “30 years 4 months”, his place of birth
as “Tirano, Italy”, his marital status as single, his occupation as “Labourer”, his next of kin
as “Emil Genoni, Broome Hill, WA”, his height as “5 foot 8 inches”, his weight as “15”
stone, his complexion as “Dark”, his eyes and hair as “Brown”, “Yes” that he was
prepared to “undergo inoculation against small pox and enteric fever”, and his “Religious
Denomination” as “Theosophy” (Genoni, 1916). Thirty percent of enlistees had their
occupation recorded as “Labourer” (Scott, 1936), theosophists would have been rare.
Ernesto was an unlikely volunteer for the Australian Imperial Force (AIF) of World War 1
(1914-1918). He was Italian, an artist, and a theosophist. He was the youngest sibling in
a pacifist family of which his older brothers had each progressively migrated to Australia
before they turned eighteen - to avoid being conscripted into the Italian army (Triaca,
1985) which was fighting Italy’s ill-conceived nineteenth century colonial expansionist
wars in Africa (including in Eritrea, Ethiopia, and Somaliland) (Nicolle, 2003).
The AIF training for war was brief: “After few weeks we were sent to continue instruction
at Bunbury to be returned again from there to Blackboy waiting to be sent overseas. I
mentioned to the sergeant how I enlisted in order to serve in the medical corp and not as
a fighter. I was told that I was a cold footed and I was left behind when my company left
for Europe. Few weeks after I left with another contingent. I was mess orderly and I liked
it” (Genoni, c.1955, p.13). Ernesto embarked on the troop ship HMAT Aeneas leaving
Fremantle on 17 April 1916 (AIF, 1916d).
These fresh unbloodied troops were sent to France via “Egypt. Suez ... The flies! The
sand storm ... we embarked at Alexandria and disembarked at Marseille. From here to
Étaples [a base camp outside of Paris] by train ... I was made cook’s helper in the
kitchen. The drilling with straw bags and bayonets. The oral instructions by that red faced
Sergeant Major!” (Genoni, c.1955, p.13).
3.5 The Somme WW1 AIF
Then we were sent to the Somme ... Pozières ... The sergeant calls for volunteer
stretcher bearers. I came forward ... the first vision of dead bodies. My inner trust of
Christ as Lord even of the shells! (Genoni, c.1955, p.14).
In 1916 there was no more dangerous place in the world to be than “the Western Front”
in general, and Pozières in particular (Charlton, 1986). The first Australian to enlist in
WWI in the AIF is buried at Pozières (Crawley, 2014). And Pozières was to be the first
engagement for Ernesto, and the AIF’s 4th Australian Division, 16th Battalion.
Once at the front line, Ernesto volunteered as a stretcher bearer.and was at immediately
in the midst of the bloody maelstrom. The Somme was, and remains, the most lethal
battlefield in which Australian troops have ever engaged. The scene at Pozières was
described as “Dead and wounded lay everywhere, some killed on their stretchers, with
the stretcher bearers lying dead beside them” (Bean, 1929, p.709).
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Journal of Organics (JO), Volume 1 Number 1, 2014
According to Charles Bean, Australia’s official war historian:
“In the first AIF everyone had looked on the work of stretcher-bearers as rather suitable for
men who, for some reason, disliked more than most the prospect of killing others ... I dare
say that in the long run a good many of those who did become stretcher-bearers ... did
volunteer for it because they were that kind of man, who deep in their hearts preferred being
killed to killing” (Bean, 1947, p.116).
“Until the First Battle of the Somme many battalions had used their bandsmen as stretcherbearers. After that battle this system generally was abandoned. For one thing, after such
battles the band was too badly needed for cheering up the troops! A battle like Pozières
sometimes made a clean sweep of the regimental bearers. Also, on its side, the work of the
bearers was too important to be left to unselected men; they were now specially selected ‘for
their physique and guts’” (p.118).
“They needed to ... stand up to a trial like that of Pozières … a reeking desert of bombarded
shell craters, the stretcher-bearers and runners were the only ones who were regularly
expected to move through barrages which ... cut off the front line from the rear. Most men
who went through the battle will recall the little parties of four or five men who would come,
erect, winding their way across that wilderness, amid the shell bursts, with the leader holding
a stick with a white rag - the handiest substitute for a red cross flag. That flag would usually
prevent the German snipers from shooting, but nothing could stop the barrages ... ‘It’s no
good dropping the stretcher now - if we’re going to be hit we shall be hit, walking or
crouching!’ So they went proudly erect at Pozières, Passchendaele and Messines, too,
throughout the war ... The stretcher-bearers won ... the highest place in the estimate of all
their comrades” (p.118).
“For men thrown into the fighting
at Pozières the experience was
simply hell … Stretcher-bearers
worked to exhaustion, usually
exposed to fire, carrying men to
the aid posts close behind the
front line. Sergeant Albert Coates
recorded: ‘Many men buried and
torn to pieces by high explosive.
For a mile behind the trenches it is
a perfect hell of shell fire. Terrible
sights. The stretcher-bearers are
having a terrible time, some blown
to pieces together with their living
freight’” (Burness, 2006).
Figure 3. Australian stretcher bearers on the Somme (Will
Dyson, 1917, Australian War Memorial Canberra, public
Ernesto wrote of: “The front line
dug-out. The soldier with the
shattered foot crawling in. My dwindling strength. Three days after we were sent back into
the rear. My failing in going back to the dug-out to bring in some of the wounded there
remained for long as an inner reproach” (Genoni, c.1955, p.14).
Of WWI stretcher-bearers “many companies had every stretcher-bearer killed or
wounded. Wherever a wounded man was seen... these men made their way, whatever
the danger ... every man watched and respected them” (Bean, 1947, p.117). Australian
war artist, Will Dyson commented: “These men are not heroes from choice - they are
heroes because someone has got to be heroic” (Dyson, 1918, p.38) (Fig.3).
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Writing on the battlefield, Lieutenant J.A. Raws described the grim situation: “We are
lousy, stinking, ragged, unshaven, sleepless ... I have a dead man’s helmet, another dead
man’s gas protector, a dead man’s bayonet. My tunic is rotten with other men’s blood,
and partly splattered with a comrade’s brains” (Bean, 1929, p.661). Both Raws and his
brother were killed soon after on the battlefields of the Somme (Bean, 1947).
The Battle of the Somme was “the bloodiest fighting of the entire war ... a merciless war
of attrition ... The tit-for-tat artillery bombardments reduced town, countryside and soldiers
to piles of pulverized waste” (Lindsay, 2011, p.101).
“After few days we were sent into Belgium. Ypres. The life in those dug-outs along the
canal, the huge rats. The horrible experience of the barrage. Another great failing of mine
when I was called to take away a dying man in the trenches … then another occasion I
saw one of the stretcher-bearers hit and fall. I gathered my courage and went out. The
whistling of bullets around me told me soon that I was the target of German
snipers” (Genoni, c.1955, pp.14-15).
A memorial plaque on a French town hall pays tribute: “In 1916 the Australian Army
entered the Western Front with a force of 180,000 men, three times the number that
served in Gallipoli in 1915. 46,000 of the 60,000 killed in the War died on the Western
Front. From a population of just 4.5 million people, 313,000 volunteered to serve during
the War. 65% of those became casualties” (Lindsay, 2011, p.111).
“Back again in the second line and again in the front line. The barrage with trench mortar.
The dying wounded in the front line during the barrage. My conduct was not brilliant. The
night in the dug out. The nightmare” (Genoni, c.1955, p.15). Ernesto’s nightmare came to
an abrupt and wholly unexpected end.
Italy declared war on Germany on 28 August 1916 (Bean, 1929) (although Italy had
entered WWI on 23 May 1915 against the Austro-Hungarian Empire). On 1 September
1916, the Italian Embassy in London wrote to the British War Office: “I am directed by H.
E. the Italian Ambassador to ask for the discharge of Pte. Ernesto Genoni No. 5362 now
serving with the 16th Battalion, 4th A.D.B.D. Australian Expeditionary Force, who is an
Italian subject and whose class has been called up for service” (Italian Embassy, 1916, p.
1). The request was forwarded by the AIF’s Lieutenant C.R.E. Jennings to AIF
administration “for any action you may deem necessary please” (Jennings, 1916)
Italy’s request reached Ernesto at the battlefront. “The corporal Cook one morning calls
me and tells me that I am to go to London for discharge from the Australian Army. At first I
thought it was a joke, but before evening I was on my way to London” (Genoni, c.1955, p.
15). “At the request of the War Office you are being transferred to A.I.F. Administrative
Headquarters, London, for discharge in order to allow you to join the Italian Army. You will
proceed to Popperinghe and catch the 6.28 train on the morning of the 16th inst., and
should report to the A.I.F Headquarters in London on the following day” (AIF, 1916g).
Ernesto was discharged from the AIF in London on 18 October 1916 “in consequence of
joining the Italian Army” (Butler, 1916, p.1). The pro forma Proceedings of Discharge
stated that the discharge was “to join the Italian Army” and incorrectly stated that “such
discharge having been granted to me in England at my own request”. His Certificate of
Character on discharge reported his “conduct and character” as “very good” (AIF, 1916c)
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Journal of Organics (JO), Volume 1 Number 1, 2014
His discharge papers record his service as “237 days” and required him to relinquish his
right to repatriation to Australia with the form stating that “I have no further claim on the
Commonwealth Government for or in respect of a free passage from England to Australia
now or at any time hereafter and do hereby release the Commonwealth Government from
all further claims and demands of any kind whatsoever except as regards any Pension to
which I may be legally entitled under the War Pensions Act” (AIF, 1916e, p.2) Ernesto
nominated the address of his “intended place of residence” as “Via Cramer 6, Milano,
Italy” which was the address of the peace organisations Comitato Pro Umanità
(Podreider, 2011) and the Italian branch of the Women’s International League for Peace
and Freedom (WILPF, 1921) in which organisations Ernesto’s sister, Rosa Genoni, was
prominent.
Being conscripted into the Italian Army unexpectedly plucked Ernesto from the “hell” of
the killing fields of the Western Front. “For his service with the Australian Imperial Force
Private Genoni is entitled to the British War and Victory medals ... His present address (if
he survives) is unknown” (AIF, 1921).
3.6 Italian Army
... the Colonel told me that I must have some good saint in Paradise looking after
me. ‘Yes’ I said ‘I believe so’ (Genoni, c.1955, p.16).
A handwritten note in Ernesto’s Australian war service records states that: “This man
joined the Italian Red Cross not the Italian Army” (AIF, 1924). What is certainly true is that
Ernesto was conscripted into the Italian Army, that the AIF facilitated this, that Ernesto
voluntarily joined the AIF, but there was nothing voluntary about his conscription into the
Italian Army.
Ernesto’s time in the Italian Army, from 1916 until he was finally demobilized (demobbed)
in March 1919 was a difficult time for him as he resisted (successfully but at personal
cost) being “an Italian infantry soldier” and the bureaucracy struggled (mostly
unsuccessfully) to cope with the concepts of ‘conscientious objection’ and ‘non-combatant
duties’ (Genoni, c.1955). The right to conscientious objection was not recognised by
Italian authorities until 1972 (Biesemans, 2014).
Ernesto's Italian military experience was punctuated with imprisonment, trials, and service
in the medical corps and a military hospital. The clash of cultures surfaced immediately
with “The refusal to repeat the giuramento formula [the oath]. Sent to prison. Called by
the company captain to explain and then sent to another prison. He told me that I was to
be sent to Verona in the medical corps for instruction and then to go to the front” (Genoni,
c.1955, p.16).
Ernesto served in the Military Hospital at Verona and he reports that “eventually I was
transferred permanently there” (Genoni, c.1955, p.16). Sister Rosa visited her brother in
Verona. He writes of “Her letter relating to rumours of peace. I read the letter loudly ... an
officer took the letter from me ... I was sent to prison ... inchained I was sent to the fort
prison on the hill near Verona waiting for the trial ... Then the trail at the Military Tribunal. I
got three months which I had already done waiting for the case” (p.17).
In “Spring 1918”, Ernesto wrote “How tired of such a life ... my conversation about
spiritual things” (Genoni, c.1955, p.17). Some optimism which creeps into his account is
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tinged with the reality of disease sweeping Europe: “Autumn 1918! The 14 points of
Wilson. I believed at the time that a new era was to enter into the World. The raging
influenza” (p.17).
To the end, the relationship between Ernesto and the Italian military was uneasy, at best it
seems to have been an uneasy truce with their pacifist conscript. “I was sent to South
Italy to accompany a convalescent soldier at his home. In returning instead of stopping at
Verona I went to Milan where I found Rosa and others of the family sick with influenza. I
stayed for few days to nurse them. Then went back to Verona to be sent to prison for
being absent without leave for weeks” (Genoni, c.1955, pp.17-18).
“November 1918 Peace! But they kept me till the following March 1919. They discharged
me without giving me il pacco di congedo on account of my bad record! But at last I was a
free civilian once more” (Genoni, c.1955, p.18).
3.7 Rudolf Steiner and Anthroposophy
Dornach ... I was trying to paint in the anthroposophic way. Again at bottom I was
not happy with my painting. I was admitted to the Class. My gradual understanding
of the German language at the lectures (Genoni, c.1955, pp.19-20).
Ernesto’s discharge from the AIF in 1916 extinguished his right to free repatriation to
Australia, and he did not return to Australia until 1926. The post war years in Europe for
Ernesto (1919-1926) witnessed his introduction to and engagement with Anthroposophy,
with its spiritual guru, Rudolf Steiner (1861-1925), and with the Goetheanum, the
headquarters of Anthroposophy at Dornach, Switzerland.
Ernesto was introduced to Anthroposophy in Milan by his sister Rosa, shortly after his
discharge from the Italian Army and he joined the Milan branch of the Anthroposophical
Society (Sekretariat, 1924-1975). “Rosa tells me of Anthroposophy ... Signorina Schwarz
was inviting Rosa to an Anthroposophy reading in the afternoon. She could not go but
asked me if I would like to go. So I went (with Fanny [Rosa’s daughter] I think) to the first
Anthroposophy meeting. For nearly 18 months I went regularly to the weekly
Anthroposophy readings. Meanwhile I took up again painting” (Genoni, c.1955, p.18).
The Anthroposophical Society was constituted on 2 February 1913 (Lissau, 2005) by Dr
Rudolf Steiner, and it grew out of the Theosophical Society which had been founded in
New York in 1875 by Helena Blavatsky (1831-1891) and was then headed by Annie
Besant (1847-1933). Steiner was the inaugural General Secretary of the German Section
of the Theosophical Society which was founded in October 1902 (Wachsmuth, 1989).
This position gave Steiner leadership of the Society in Germany, Switzerland and AustriaHungary (Easton, 1980). In this role Steiner lectured and published extensively (e.g
Steiner, 1910, 1911). A philosophical falling out between Steiner and the Theosophical
Society leadership, based in Adyar, Chennai (then Madras), India, culminated in the
expulsion of the German Section from the Theosophical Society in January 1913 (Easton,
1980). The Anthroposophical Society was founded in the wake of this expulsion with
Steiner as Honorary President, the assets of the defunct Section were transferred to the
new entity (Easton, 1980). At the time there were over 2500 members of the German
Section and most moved their affiliation across to the new society (Easton, 1980). Steiner
subsequently refounded the Society as the General Anthroposophical Society on 24
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Journal of Organics (JO), Volume 1 Number 1, 2014
December 1923 (Steiner, 1923). Both Theosophy and Anthroposophy are non-religious
groups offering similar but different spiritual esoteric philosophies. Both movements are in
the perennialist/traditionalist school of philosophy (Huxley, 1946) which was also
championed by Lord Northbourne (1896-1982), the biodynamic farmer who coined the
term ‘organic farming’ (Paull, 2014a).
Rudolf Steiner was a polymath who has been described as “one of the greatest men of
the twentieth century” (Wilson, 1985, p.170) and “one of the most influential - yet also
controversial - reformers of the 20th century” (Vegesack & Kries, 2010, p.16). Steiner was
prolific, he delivered more than 5,000 lectures (Stewart, 2012) and is the author of more
than 300 books (Turgeniev, 2003). In person, he was charismatic, and as a speaker,
mesmerizing. He spoke extemporaneously, he “used no notes at all” (Sunday School
Chronicle, 1922). His writing has been described as “impenetrable” (Lachman, 2007, p.
114) but in person “he possessed the qualities of expositor and preacher to a matchless
degree ... Dr Steiner ... soon holds his listeners under the spell of his power” (Hare, 1922,
p.219). Steiner left some listeners “deeply impressed” and others “frankly
perplexed” (Manchester Guardian, 1922). Worldwide practical movements have grown
out of Steiner’s New Age philosophies including Waldorf education and biodynamic
agriculture.
When Ernesto left Australia in 1916, he stated his religion as “Theosophist”. A decade
later when he returned to Australia he was an Anthroposophist. It was a journey fostered
by Rosa and entrenched by visits to Dornach, meeting Steiner, and attending Steiner’s
lectures. Anthroposophy was to become a lifelong raison d’être for Ernesto.
“In 1920 ... I went to Dornach. What a strange impression I received from the first view of
the Goetheanum building ... the short conversation with Fräulein [Elizabeth] Vreede
[1879-1943] ... chilly! ... the meeting with the Doctor [Rudolf Steiner] ... the bewildering
impression of the interior of the Goetheanum. I could not enter in such saturated life of
the spirit and after a few days I left ... the reproach from Miss [Edith] Maryon [1872-1924].
In the following years it was a painful search to find my way in life” (Genoni, c.1955, p.
19).
The Goetheanum building (pronounced girty-arn-um) takes its name from the German
philosopher Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832) who has been characterized as a
“universal genius” (Viëtor, 1950, p.3). Steiner had spent years editing Goethe’s scientific
works for publication and was “the leading expert on Goethe’s scientific
writings” (Hemleben, 1963, p.46). At the time of the split with the Theosophical Society,
money had already been collected and a building designed by Steiner, primarily as a
theatrical space. The Munich authorities denied planning permission for the new
construction which Steiner described as embodying “a new conception of
architecture” (Steiner, 1914, p.27). The denial of planning permission coincided with a
lecture tour to Switzerland by Steiner. He was offered vacant land on a hillside
overlooking the Swiss village of Dornach on the outskirts of Basel. The outcome of this
generosity was that the Goetheanum was built on the Dornach land and became the
headquarters of the Anthroposophical Society (Easton, 1980).
It was this first Goetheanum building that had such an impact on Ernesto in 1920. Easton
(1980, p.273) writes that “by 1920 the building was by no means finished ... Nevertheless
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by 1920 the exterior of the Goetheanum was finished, and the stage was usable, even
though the seats in the auditorium were not yet in place”. The first Goetheanum was a
multi-domed construction of timber with a slate roof. It burnt to the ground on New Year’s
Eve 1922/23 (Lissau, 2005). Steiner designed the second Goetheanum as a bold
manifestation of Anthroposophic architecture and, with a thought to flammability, this
second reincarnation was in reinforced concrete. It is this second Goetheanum that
present visitors can marvel at as an architectural masterpiece, and that Ernesto would
have visited on his later trips to Dornach.
Ernesto married but it was not a happy match. “Lidia ... the sad marriage. ... Right
through they were sad years ... Lydia left at the beginning of 1924. Soon after I went to
Dornach” (Ernesto uses both spellings, Lidia and Lydia) (Genoni, c.1955, p.19). Lydia
Hillbrand was born in Wells, Austria, she was 14 years younger than Ernesto, they had no
children together, and he reported her living in London when he later applied for
Australian naturalization (Genoni, 1932b).
Ernesto was at this stage associating with Alfred Meebold (1863-1952), anthroposophist
and author (e.g. 1937, 1940), and this friendship was later maintained by Meebold’s visits
to him in Australia - in both WA and Victoria.
At Dornach, Ernesto was painting, attending anthroposophy lectures, and trying to master
German. Steiner’s lectures were in German, and Dornach is in the German-speaking
region of Switzerland.
In June 1924 Steiner travelled to Koberwitz (then Germany, now Kobierzyce, Poland) and
presented the eight lectures of the Agriculture Course (Steiner, 1924a, 1924c). It was the
only time he presented an agriculture course. There were 111 attendees from six
countries, Germany (N=61), Poland (N=30), Austria (N=9), Switzerland (N=7), France
(N=2), Sweden (N=2), with none were from Italy (Paull, 2011a), and although it seems
that Ernesto was at the Goetheanum at this time (Genoni, c.1955) he did not travel to
attend the Koberwitz course.
Ernesto reports that “Rosa and Fanny went to England to the anthroposophy gathering at
Torquay [England]” (Genoni, c.1955, p.20). It was Steiner’s final trip to Britain and he
sought to entrench his Waldorf education in the Anglo-world (Merry, 1924; Steiner, 1924b,
1924d).
Ernesto writes cryptically of “the big Michael painting” and he states that “In September of
that year [1924] the Doctor became ill. I returned to Milan” (Genoni, c.1955, p.20). Steiner
withdrew from public life on 28 September confined to his sick bed, and he died 30 March
1925 (Collison, 1925).
“In Spring 1925 Caldera came to see me and persuade me to return to Australia with him.
The funny assessment of the Taxation officer ... at the date I would have to pay I was on
the sea on the way to Australia” (Genoni, c.1955, pp.20-21). Ernesto was now aged 40,
and although his vocational training was in art, he was nevertheless somewhat unsettled
and ambivalent about his art. He was leaving behind a post-war Europe of mixed
experiences, where a lowlight was “the sad marriage”, and a highlight was Steiner’s
Anthroposophy which nourished his spiritual cravings.
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3.8 Migration to Australia
Mr Genoni will proceed to Melbourne, where he will open a studio and hold an
exhibition of his work (The Australasian, 1926, p.47).
Ernesto arrived in Australia, for the third time, in 1926, and this time it could be fairly
characterized as an emigration. He had been in Europe for a decade, firstly on the
Western Front as a stretcher-bearer with the AIF, then in prison and the medical corps
with the Italian Army, he had an estranged wife who refused him a divorce, he had
discovered Anthroposophy under the tutelage of Rudolf Steiner, and he had tried his hand
as an anthro-artist, painting in the anthroposophic style.
He brought to Australia an exhibition of his art works and this was announced in the
Australian press in Perth (The West Australian, 1926), Adelaide (The Advertiser, 1926)
and Melbourne (The Australasian, 1926). A Melbourne newspaper reported that: “After
remaining in Western Australia for about a month, Mr Genoni will proceed to Melbourne,
where he will open a studio and hold an exhibition of his work. He has made
arrangements for a group of Italian artists to forward samples of their work periodically for
exhibition in Australian cities” (The Australasian, 1926, p.47). The account reported that
after serving in the AIF and the Italian army: “He then settled in Italy and took up his
former profession as an artist” (The Australasian, 1926, p.47).
It seems that Ernesto’s Plan A, the art exhibition, never materialized, nor a studio, nor the
importation of contemporary Italian art works. They receive no mention at all in Ernesto’s
memoirs. The art certainly arrived and there are art works by Ernesto in Western Australia
and Victoria, and Peggy Macpherson remembers there being many paintings in his (later)
Melbourne residence shared with his partner Ileen (Macpherson, 2014).
A handful of oil paintings
have been sighted by the
author and on that basis it
can be said that some of the
art is signed “E. Genoni”
and some others are
unsigned (Fig.4). It seems
that the art arrived as flat
canvasses - which would be
a sensible choice for the
convenience and cost of
transport - and that it was
(or some of it was) stretched
and framed in Western
Figure 4. Oil painting by Ernesto Genoni (undated).
Australia (on the basis that
at least one stretcher is
labelled with the Australian branding “Cooee”. Known art includes portraits, Italianesque
landscapes and a still life.
There are at least four reasons, that can be speculated, as to why the exhibition never
eventuated. Firstly, Ernesto arrived at the onset of a recession (in Australia and
elsewhere) just before the Great Depression (Crabbe, 1989), businesses and farms were
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struggling to survive, and the discretionary spend was probably at its low point for the
twentieth century. England was the major destination for Australian agricultural exports.
Prices were deflating, and agricultural wages in England had fallen by 33% from 1920 to
1926 (Ernle, 1927). Secondly, Australia had been bloodied in a hard and bitter WWI, had
lost much of the flower of its youth to Euro-bullets and Euro-politics, and now, in the
1920s and 1930s, the esteem that the old-world had perhaps enjoyed pre-WWI was now
somewhat tarnished. Australians were jaded with Europe, the experience of WWI had
been bitter and devastating for Australia. Thirdly, in the interbellum years (from the end of
WWI to the outbreak of WWII) Australian art was itself coming of age, and to the fore,
European-trained artists and home-grown artists had, after some mis-steps, learned to
capture the light, the landscape, and the eucalypts of the new continent. As Australian
artist Lloyd Rees observed “After the war [WWI] there was an amazing spirit abroad in
Sydney - a triumphant feeling. There was an uprising of intense Australianism, which was
not confined to the painters but spread to the writers as well” (Rees, 1985, p.112).
Fourthly, there was Ernesto himself. He was always a modest and self effacing man, a
thinker, a philosopher, and, yes, an artist, but never a salesman, a marketer, a selfpromoter, nor an entrepreneur, such latter skills would have proven useful, and perhaps
even essential, for a successful art career.
The first stop in Australia for Ernesto was Emilio’s farm, Etna, in WA. As Triaca tells it:
“Then came anthroposophy, the philosophy of the Austrian, Rudolf Steiner. It arrived at
the Genoni’s through their youngest brother, Ernesto ... For the Genoni’s anthroposophy
was like a religion with its own shrine - the Goetheanum in Switzerland - and its own holy
books - the teachings of Rudolf Steiner. Ernesto became the master’s disciple, his
brothers the willing students. They would have study evenings up at Etna where they
read aloud Rudolf Steiner’s published works on subjects as diverse as spiritualism, the
education of children and physiology and therapeutics ... Part of it was natural healing
and organic farming” (Triaca, 1985, p.116).
In 1927, Ernesto travelled to Melbourne, then “went to Dalmore [70 km south east of
Melbourne] at the time Morris and the other Italians took up the Makillic farm (Genoni, c.
1955, p.21). Farm work was interspersed with art: “I was doing some fotography [sic] for
the Sicilians. Vacarri’s pastel portrait” (p.21).
In terms of leaving his mark in Australia - and in terms of Anthroposophy and biodynamic
agriculture - 1928 was a key year for Ernesto. He writes that “In 1928(?) I discovered Mrs
Macky at the New Conservatorium [of Music]. We started some Anthroposophy meetings
in Hope Street at Mrs Hawkins’ house” (Genoni, c.1955, p.21). This laid the foundations
for the Anthroposophy Society in Australia, Victoria, aka the Michael Group (Macpherson,
c.1990) which exists to the present. Anne Macky was a music composer who had, on a
visit to Britain in 1922, seen an advertisement for Steiner’s Education Conference at
Oxford University (Paull, 2011c) and on the basis of the flyer had attended the
Conference (Bak, 1996).
In 1932, Ernesto was a cofounder, in Melbourne, of the Anthroposophy Society in
Australia, Victoria, Michael Group, and he was active in it for the next four decades, that
is the rest of his life. He was from 1962 the leader of the Michael Group (Macpherson, c.
1990).
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3.9 The Agriculture Course, The Experimental Circle, and the European Grand Tour
of Biodynamics
In 1930 I went to Dornach again to become acquainted with the B.D. farming
(Genoni, c.1955, p.21).
In 1928 Ernesto applied to join the
Experimental Circle of Anthroposophical
Farmers and Gardeners (ECAFG). He was the
first Australian to join the Experimental Circle
(Paull, 2013). By the time of the Agriculture
Course (June 1924) Rudolf Steiner was
mortally ill, and he probably knew it. He
warned the attendees of the Course that they
should take all he said as “hints”, that they
should put everything to the test, and when
everything was tested it should be presented
to the world (1924a; 1924e, p.10). The
Experimental Circle was Steiner’s vehicle
intended to achieve this outcome, and over
time the Circle attracted members from
Europe, Africa, the Americas and Australasia.
When Ernesto joined the Circle these were still
‘early days’, the term ‘biodynamic’ had not
been coined, and it was not until Dr Ehrenfried
Pfeiffer’s 1938 book Biodynamic Farming and
Gardening that there was a ‘coming out’ of
biodynamics as a named and differentiated
agriculture offering global antidote to chemical
agriculture (Paull, 2011b; Pfeiffer, 1938).
Figure 5. Rudolf Steiner’s Agriculture Course
(in German) #165 issued to Ernesto Genoni;
inscribed “Herrn Genoni (Australia)”.
Ernesto’s memoir states that “in 1929 I received the Agriculture Course from
Dornach” (Genoni, c.1955, p.21). His copy of the Agriculture Course was in German, he
applied for membership of the Experimental Circle in 1928 nominating that experimental
work would be carried out at Dalmore Farm in Victoria. At this time, the transcript of the
Agriculture Course was only issued to members of the ECAFG and each copy was
numbered. Ernesto’s copy of the Agriculture Course is inscribed as #165, and it survives
to this day with Ernesto’s makeshift reinforced bindings along with his pencilled
annotations (Fig.5). The first English edition of the Agriculture Course did not appear until
1929, and all subsequent Australian members of the Experimental Circle - including his
brother Emilio - received typescript English language versions of the Course (and the
numbers are prefaced with an ‘E’) (Paull, 2013).
Ernesto embarked on a grand tour of biodynamics in Europe in 1930 - Switzerland (14
June -15 July), Germany (15 July - 12 September), England (13 September - 1 October).
He declared in his naturalization paperwork that the object of the journey was
“Agricultural studies” (Genoni, 1932b, p.1).
Ernesto states that: “In 1930 I went to Dornach again to become acquainted with the B.D.
farming” (Genoni, c.1955, p.21). What follows in his memoir is a Who’s Who of the
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leading practitioners and advocates of biodynamics in Europe at the time: “[Ehrenfried]
Pfeiffer ... [Erika] Riese ... Count Lerchenfeld ... [Ernst] Stegemann at Marienhöhe ...
[Erhard] Bartch near Berlin ... [Max] Schwarz near Bremen ... London with [Carl] Mirbt ...
Return to the continent via Holland, [Ehrenfried] Pfeiffer Farm at Rosendale ... Then
Dornach and then Marseilles where we [Ernesto & Fred] embark on the Ville d’Amiens for
Australia” (pp.21-22).
It seems likely that on such a seriously and thoughtfully constructed study tour that
Ernesto would have documented and recorded his experience - given that he had been a
tertiary student for five years, that he later wrote a memoir, and that the objective of this
study tour was educational, and was to capture for himself and his New World colleagues
the practices and the lessons learned in Europe for anthroposophic farming.
Anthroposophic farming was later called ‘biodynamic farming’ and ‘biodynamics’, thereby
satisfying Steiner’s injunction to decouple the practices from Anthroposophy and to let his
new agriculture stand on its own merits. Travel notebook/s of Ernesto have not been
uncovered by the present author, but if they existed, they were likely valued by Ernesto
and we could be optimistic that they may still surface.
Ernesto’s 1932 Application for Naturalization followed close on the heels of his return
from the BD trip to Europe. His reason for applying for naturalization is stated as
“Permanent residence and desires full citizenship” and the application stated that he was
in good health (Nuschell, 1932).
“Back to Etna with Fred. He soon proceeds for Victoria while I remain at Etna till the
beginning of 1933” (Genoni, c.1955, p.22). Australia, and the world, or at least Australia’s
major agricultural trading partners, were still in the midst of the Depression and this hit
Australian farmers hard. Ernesto reported a second visit by Alfred Meebold,
anthroposophist and biodynamicist. Ernesto writes of “The attempt to do BD. We bought
cows and sent cream to the Butter Factory - rearing pigs with wheat and skimmed milk.
Made insilage ... during winter was fed to the sheep. We grew blue peas and lupins” (p.
22).
However: “The Bank closed in and the farm got near bankruptcy” (Genoni, c.1955, p.22).
This was the end of Ernesto’s Western Australia adventures. He writes that “Angelo from
Melbourne offered me the Dalmore farm to manage. Went to Victoria once more and
started at Dalmore. We build the little house” (p.23).
At this stage Ernesto is in his late forties. “Started to go again to the Anthroposophy
meetings in Collins Street. This is where I met first Ileen and Mrs R[uby] Macpherson.
The letter from Ileen and our first meeting in Dandenong ... Our meetings then become
more frequent” (Genoni, c.1955, p.23).
At this point meteorology intervenes. “The flood destroyed everything at the [Dalmore]
farm. Then the idea arose of starting a B.D. farm with Ileen in Dandenong. My meetings
with the Macpherson Family in Punt Road. - Then the farm on the highway was bought. I
started working there living in a tent and boarding with Mrs Armor” (p.23).
In his memoirs Ernesto only states one date with precision. He writes that “On the 14
March 1935 Ileen came to live at the farm” (Genoni, c.1955, p.23). He is aged 49. He
reports that “The crop paddock was plowed up and the first crop of peas without any
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Journal of Organics (JO), Volume 1 Number 1, 2014
manure was put in ... The miserable peas crop ... got stable manure wherever we could
get it. The next 10 acres near the creek were bought and later Mr Mehan 19 acres ...
Fred comes to work ... Mr Meebold comes to stay for a fortnight at the farm ... The
unhappy struggling for making a B.D farm. The sales of vegetables on the road” (pp.
23-24).
Always the restless soul, Ernesto records that “I am planning to go to Europe, but Ileen
gets sick and is sent to hospital in Brighton. Eventually she is returning home. Again in
1938 I am planning to go to Europe with the understanding that Ileen should
follow” (Genoni, c.1955, p.24). He leaves alone on a German freighter “with only one
other traveller. A poor trip!” (p.25). Perhaps the goal of the trip was to seek a divorce, in
any event he records that “Met again Lydia .... a further attempt to get a divorce, but
unsuccessful. Gone to Dornach ... the dark clouds of war are gathering over Europe ... I
left for Australia in June or July 1939” (p.25). This was Ernesto's final trip to Europe.
When he returned from Europe: “At the farm I found things with Ileen not too good ...
World War II. We carried on the milk contract ... up to March 1940 ... Ileen carried on the
milking ... but her legs begin to give away” (Genoni, c.1955, p.25).
“Mrs Macpherson bought for me the block in Namur Street ... Ileen is sent to hospital
again ... But gradually her legs are getting worse. She had to be taken to hospital but it
was too late; she could not walk anymore” (Genoni, c.1955, pp.25-26).
From hospital “Ileen returns to the farm where we live together. In 1952 we decide to
build the new house in Namur St. In September 1953 Ileen comes to the new home and
in March 1954 the farm is sold” (Genoni, c.1955, p.26). Ernesto is by now aged 69 years.
Ileen was by this time wheelchair bound and Ernesto was her carer (Macpherson, 2014).
The records of the Anthroposophy Society at Dornach have Ernesto’s address as 17
Namur St, Noble Park, Victoria from December 1954 through to his death in 1975
(Sekretariat, 1924-1975).
The final paragraph in Ernesto's memoir is “From the beginning of 1952 we have the
monthly study of the Leading Thoughts at the central Group, while since 1944 we have
meetings in Avoca St and Sandringham and then at Kooyong Rd” (p.26).
4 Conclusion
Ernesto Genoni was a modest man, a restless soul, a seeker, an artist, a WWI volunteer,
a conscientious objector, a theosophist, a pioneering anthroposophist in Australia, the
pioneering biodynamic farmer in Australia, a man of unrealized dreams, and a devoted
partner of Ileen Macpherson. He lived through the tumultuous times of WWI, the Great
Depression, and WWII. This is the first account of his life other than an account of his
Somme experience and a conference presentation earlier this year and (Paull, 2014b,
2014c). A future account of his life may benefit from some further discovery of letters and
correspondence, notes, artworks, and photographs, and perhaps, as well, the memoirs of
others, at least some of which may have survived the ravages of time and loss of
provenance and which were not available for the present account.
There are many ‘what ifs’ that arise from the present account. Ernesto was known in the
family as “the artist” (E. Negri, 1984, p.5; Triaca, 1985, p.89) and he had five years art
training at the prestigious Brera Academy in Milan. Yet when he volunteered in the AIF he
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had his occupation as “labourer” (AIF, 1916a, p.1) - if he had been more forthright might
he have been a Australian war artist? Decades later when he applied for naturalization he
had is occupation as “farmer” (Genoni, 1932b, p.1). Ernesto was always somewhat
ambivalent about his art. When he returned to Australia from Europe after a decade
away, he announced a forthcoming art exhibition. This plan was scuppered by some
combination of Ernesto’s own reticence, the economic recession and the onset of the
Great Depression, and perhaps the lack of sibling support whose skills were agricultural.
It is unclear if Ernesto ever made that challenging transition from Euro-style artist to
Australian artist - a path travelled with some success by, for example, British trained artist
John Glover (Hansen, 2003), German trained artist Eugene von Guérard (Pullin, 2011),
and mastered by Australian-trained artist Hans Heysen (Hylton & Neylon, 2004).
In 1926 Ernesto was announcing a planned exhibition of his art so it is quite possible,
perhaps likely, that a distributed exhibition of his works still exists. There are at least
works known (to the author) to exist in Victoria and Western Australia, and there is the
prospect of the survival of some works in Italy and perhaps Switzerland. Perhaps at some
future time Ernesto’s 1926-planned exhibition can materialize?
What if Ernesto had emigrated to Australia at some time other than in the midst of a
recession? Would his planned art exhibition had been realized, would there have been a
future as an artist?
What if his estranged wife, Lydia, had agreed to a divorce instead of refusing? Divorce
was forbidden to Catholics which may account for her refusal. Australia’s current no-fault
divorce following twelve months separation was not introduced until The Family Law Act
of 1975. Would Ernesto have married Ileen? Started a family?
What if the AIF had not turned Ernesto over to the Italians? Had turned a blind eye to the
request for the handover? The handover was ethically rather dubious given that Ernesto
had volunteered for the AIF whereas the Italians were conscripting him off the battlefields
of France. Australians were antagonistic to the idea of conscription, voting against it in
two WWI referenda (Scott, 1936). Or what if the cogs of the Italian, British and Australian
bureaucracy had not turned so fast, so accurately and so efficiently? The upside of the
Italian conscription was that Ernesto survived the war, he was evacuated from the most
dangerous killing fields of WWI, and his life expectancy was restored from the
abbreviated life expectancy of a stretcher-bearer on the Somme.
What if Ernesto had written - of course perhaps he did - accounts of his time at the
Goetheanum with Rudolf Steiner (1920-1924), and of his grand tour of biodynamics in
Europe in 1930? Triaca has written that: “In those days we used postcards all the
time” (1985, p.79), and this leaves open some hope that caches of correspondence
between Ernesto and his family, Ileen, Meebold, and other associates may have survived.
For the time being, the present account reports what is known of the life of Ernesto
Genoni, former theosophist and pioneering anthroposophist, who in 1928 brought
biodynamics to Australia and co-founded the Anthroposophy Society in Victoria. It was a
life of adventure and misadventure, of trailblazing, of struggle, of disappointment, and of
spiritual reflection.
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Acknowledgments
Thank you to the individuals and organisations that have assisted the development of this
research, including the Sekretariat of the Anthroposophical Society, Goetheanum,
Dornach, Switzerland, the Archives of the Goetheanum (Dokumentation am Goetheanum
Bibliothek Kunstsammlung Archiv), the Australian National Archives, Canberra, Dr Paul
Genoni, Dr Paolo Baracchi of the Italian Historical Society, Melbourne, Greg Holly of
Broomehill, Margaret Garner, Peggy Macpherson, Anita Sharpe, Pam Martin, the
Anthroposophical Society in Australia Victorian Branch, the Michael Centre, Jan BakerFinch, General Secretary of the Anthroposophical Society in Australia, and Greg
Accornero and Carla Deiana for translations.
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